1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a recording and/or reproducing apparatus, a recording and/or reproducing method, and an information storage medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, an optical disk is widely used as an information storage medium in an optical pickup apparatus for recording and/or reproducing information. According to the information recording capacity, the optical disc is classified into a compact disk (CD) and a digital versatile disk (DVD). Optical disks capable of recording, deleting, and reproducing data include a 650 MB CD-R, a CD-RW, and a 4.7 GB DVD+RW, and optical disks for reproducing data include a 650 MB CD, and a 4.7 GB DVD-ROM. Furthermore, a HD-DVD having a recording capacity of over 25 GB is under development.
Due to recent developments of optical disk technologies, semiconductor technologies, and recording/reproducing strategies, addition of new functions and recording layers to an optical disk, and increases in a recording speed, standards for optical systems, including optical drive systems and optical disks need to be constantly updated.
FIG. 1 is a reference diagram explaining the problem of disk compatibility according to the conventional technology.
Assuming that a conventional standard is referred to as an ‘old’ standard and a standard updated by increasing the number of recording layers, increasing the recording speed or adding a write strategy to the old standard, is referred to as a ‘new’ standard, an old standard disk 110 is made to operate in an old standard drive system 111 and a new standard disk 120 is made to operate in a new standard drive system 121.
Due to the added characteristics, that is, the number of recording layers, the recording speed, or the write strategy, the old standard and the new standard may or may not be compatible for recording and/or reproducing data. The recording and/or reproducing compatibility of the two standards means that the old standard disk 110 used in the old standard drive system 111 can also be used in the new standard drive system 121 for data recording and/or reproducing. Also, it means that the new standard disk 120 used in the new standard drive system 121 can also be used in the old standard drive system 111 for data recording and/or reproducing.
In order to guarantee mutual recording and/or reproducing compatibility between the two standards, when the new standard disk 120 to which new functions are applied is loaded on the old standard drive system 111, the old standard drive system 111 needs to provide an appropriate treatment for the new function. For this, when the old standard is set up, an appropriate treatment for future addition of new characteristics should be prepared.
In addition, this appropriate treatment should be a generalized one that can be applied to the new standard, because it should be able to be applied even when the new standard is updated by adding another new characteristic.
Accordingly, in order for a series of different standards to be mutually compatible for recording and/or reproducing, preparation for addition of new characteristics should be performed when the standard is set up. For this, it is necessary to set up a rule by which a drive system operates in a known current standard, and a common rule by which the current drive system operates in the future standard and which is not known to the current standard.
That is, if the characteristic of a disk is recorded on the disk in the form of information that can be commonly recognized by different disk standards, even when a future disk to which a new characteristic is added is loaded on a current standard drive system, according to the information, recognizable information on the disk is read such that the disk can be used.
Accordingly, in order to guarantee flexibility and scalability of a disk information structure when variables such as a write strategy are added in addition to increasing the number of recording layers and the recording speed, a disk information structure and a recording method for a disk information structure are needed.
Also, when a plurality of disk information structures exists on one medium, there is a need to quickly find a disk information structure appropriate to the recording characteristic from a plurality of disk information structures.